While representatives from many nations signed the landmark Paris Agreement about greenhouse gas emissions, students, professors and guest lecturers descended on Stony Brook last week to celebrate and discuss ways of protecting the environment as a part of Earthstock.

The 15th annual event, which featured activities and a celebration of student research, included a lecture from Charles Wurster, founder of the Environmental Defense Fund, who offered ways to persuade the public to support saving the environment.

Wurster described the beginning of the EDF, which started modestly in Stony Brook with a meeting of nine environmental scientists and one lawyer to prevent the loss of birds amid the use of the insecticide DDT.

Wurster and his colleagues were “sitting around a coffee table figuring out how to take on” a wide range of groups, including the federal government, to get them to stop spraying a pesticide that was weakening the shells of raptor eggs, said Malcolm Bowman, distinguished service professor at the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences and academic co-chair of Earthstock. Bowman said one of the reasons he joined Stony Brook in 1971 was because he “could see a revolution taking place.”

The university’s continued commitment to the environment was on display all week.

The annual celebration included a rubber duck race down a “stony brook,” outdoor yoga at the Staller Center, and a performance by a local band called Peatmoss and the Fertilizers.

Jeffrey Barnett, the interim associate dean of students and the administrative co-chair for Earthstock, said the program helps Stony Brook “connect with the local community by taking actions and educating the next generation. The festival is a way to engage people.”

John Warner, co-founder of Warner Babcock Institute for Green Chemistry, provided the keynote speech on Friday.

Warner suggested that “if we knew what we were doing, we wouldn’t have all these problems” with toxic chemicals, Bowman said. As an example, Bowman said, Warner described a beetle that sheds its skin. The chemical in that skin has remarkable dying properties and could be used in hair dye.

Warner is involved in supporting green asphalt and green chemistry, said Karina Yager, a visiting assistant professor. “Hearing his passion helps reinforce how important it is to stay engaged with this sustainability framework,” Yager said.

Earth science and environmental science teacher Rob Gelling, from Kings Park High School, brought 22 students to the festivities on Friday.

His students “enjoyed the feedback from the general public that came to our table and learned about the ability to recycle,” Geller said. His students highlighted a way to repurpose Keurig K-cups into containers in which they planted seeds. Half of the germination medium came from dried and sifted coffee grinds.

Back at the United Nations on Earth Day, the United States joined officials from other countries to sign the Paris agreement.

“There is momentum” in fighting climate change, said Yager. “Major changes have to be implemented within the next few decades to reach that goal realistically. Some are skeptical, but at least we’re on the right pathway.”

Yager said the week-long activities at Earthstock can contribute to action and awareness in the Stony Brook and Long Island communities.

“I remember when Earth Day was just a day,” Yager said. Now Earthstock is a week, which includes opportunities to “meet people who share the same vision and find out new ways to get involved.”

Some ideas or lessons stick with us through the decades. Religions offer plenty: We should treat others the way we want to be treated and we should respect our elders, to name two.

From my grammar school world, the Venn diagram is one concept that offers such a wonderful visual image that I think about it or rely on it with some regularity.

Do you remember the Venn diagram? It has two adjoining circles with a varying amount of overlap in the middle, and the theory can be applied to almost any circumstance.

Let’s start with sports, where passions are high, but the consequences of any single event or season are, relatively speaking, much lower.

Red Sox and Yankee fans would seem to have almost nothing in common, with two circles drawn as far away on a page as humanly possible. But each year there is at least one game where a Red Sox fan might root for a Yankee and a Yankee might root for a member of the Red Sox. Yes, think about it. The all-star game determines the home field advantage for the World Series. If the result of the all-star game was on the line and a member of the Red Sox could win the game with a home run, wouldn’t a Yankee fan begrudgingly cheer for that player in the hope that if our team made it to a seventh game of the World Series, the game would be at Yankee Stadium? There, we might get to see our team win a title instead of in a National League park.

From the passion of sports to the passions in our lives, a Venn diagram can also be useful in affairs of the heart. Let’s say you’re dating and you’re exploring similarities in your partner. Do you like the same food, books and movies? Do you have the same view on the importance of family, the role you might play in a community or the value of vacation time?

While all of these questions might lead to a better understanding of where you have common ground, marriage counselors or even dating services might suggest that circles with a perfect overlap might not create a perfect couple. After all, some differences or nonoverlapping spaces might make for a refreshing extension of our own circles. Maybe, as part of these relationships, we look for ways to expand the circles that define what we know and have experienced.

Even relationships that have ended can help shape ways to find common ground with someone else.

Then there’s politics. We will need to pick a president in November. Do any of the candidates overlap with your circle? Maybe, instead of looking at the breadth of their campaigns, you can consider the depth or importance of any one issue, extending that middle ground into a three-dimensional space. Maybe your vote will reflect whatever common ground you can find on a single issue, while rolling your eyes at the differences on so many other topics.

Ultimately, it seems that the most effective politician might not be someone who wants to fight for us, as Hillary Clinton suggests in her campaign mantra. And it might not be someone who wants to make America great again, as Donald Trump urges. Instead, it might be someone who can find the greatest common ground with other politicians and with other Americans.

We know that the best policies for Iowa likely won’t be the best for New York, but there must be ways to get New Yorkers and Iowans to find a national leader who can represent all of us — and not just those who are part of our inner circle.

My nephew will never be on a Wheaties box. He won’t be on the cover of Sports Illustrated, either, and he won’t be in a team picture that glows with the warmth of broad, confident smiles at the end of a championship season.

Nonetheless, he works just as hard and puts in just as much time, dedicating himself to college sports at his Division I school as do many of the athletes whose natural talents and achievements thousands of students, alumni and fans applaud at arenas, fields and stadiums around the country.

My nephew is an emergency medical technician and is studying the field of kinesiology, which is the science of human movement. Someday he will either be a doctor, a trainer or some combination thereof where his knowledge of the way the body works will enable him to help athletes and nonathletes alike overcome injuries, stresses and strains or their own physical challenges.

He is a part of the team behind the team. He doesn’t lead chants and he doesn’t scream for the adoring fans to get out of their seats. He helps get athletes back on their feet again back in the stadium, and back to doing what they love when the inevitable battle of wills brings two people into the same space at the same time.

Every morning he gets up some time around sunrise, as he slowly slinks out of his dorm room to the training center. There, he waits patiently, hoping his services aren’t necessary but ready, willing and able to help any of the injured athletes who need immediate medical attention.

He is like so many of the other medical and emergency response crews who close their eyes not knowing whether they’ll be able to rest for two minutes, two hours or 10 hours when they go to sleep.

He works with amateur athletes who might one day make an Olympic team, a professional team, set a school record in an athletic event or simply bring glory to his college for one magnificent day. He dedicates himself, day after day, to his fellow students.

We recently visited him at his school, where he had a rare day off because the team he’s helping didn’t need him that day. We twisted his arm to watch a softball game on an unusually cold afternoon.

The team played a doubleheader. My nephew saw his counterpart on the field during the first game of the doubleheader. The next day, he said he found out that his friend arrived two hours before the first game and didn’t leave until at least an hour after the second game ended, which means he spent about nine hours of a weekend day focused on supporting these athletes.

This is great training, building his professional endurance, giving him opportunities to see sports injuries — and helping him figure out where on the medical sports spectrum he’d like to dedicate himself. Still, I couldn’t help remembering some of the slow, lazy mornings in college, the hours tossing a baseball back and forth on a lawn, and the carefree joy of watching my school’s hockey team win a big game. My nephew, by choice, spends hours he could be studying or hanging out with buddies playing an important supportive role well behind the bench.

Athletes defy gravity, each other and their own limitations to become the kinds of heroes we celebrate each day. At the same time, when those limitations catch up with them, they turn to people like my nephew and a deep bench of medical talent to bring them back to the games they love. My nephew may not be on the field but he, like so many others at these big schools with winning athletic programs, plays an important role off of it.

Forgive me for smiling. In my head, I see a face. It could be the face of a mother, father, sister, brother, neighbor or even the face in the mirror.

I think of all the range of expressions and emotions from that face. It can be ecstatic that a son or daughter was born, it can be pushing hard to bring that baby into the world, it can be straining with all its might to cross a finish line — or it can be waiting anxiously at an elegant eatery for an eHarmony date to appear while trying to appear casually indifferent.

With my quality time often involving my wife and children, I picture the faces of the parents who attend a concert or sporting event, while also envisioning the faces of the kids battling against each other, the clock, their instruments or some confounding assignment.

The part about the faces that’s bringing a smile to my own is envisioning a scrambler button, mismatching the words and expressions to the situation. Instead of a face and tone that showed rapturous glee after getting a ticket to a live performance at Madison Square Garden, I’ve imagined that same elation at the beginning of a class.

“Yes, children, please put your notebooks away,” a teacher might say. “We have a surprise quiz today.”

“Oh, seriously? That’s awesome. Oh, man. I can’t wait to tell my friends on Snapchat that we got a surprise quiz. This is the best. I mean, we sometimes have regular quizzes that we know about in advance, but a surprise quiz is a huge bonus. I imagined surprise quizzes when I was younger, but this is the real thing. You are the absolute best teacher I’ve ever had and I’m sure I’ll remember this quiz for a long time.”

Now, I know those of you with adolescent children can hear sarcasm in that conversation. I prefer to imagine unbridled enthusiasm.

The scrambler button may be used in different circumstances.

Perhaps our boss described our work as “moronic.” Let’s dial in the goofy uncle trying to get a nephew to giggle.

“Oh, yeah, who’s a great boss?” you might say as your voice rises. “Come on. Who? Oh, wait, where’d you go?” you ask, as you cover your eyes. “Where’s that great boss of mine? Did you disappear? Where’s the boss? Where is the most spectacular boss anyone has ever seen? There he is … peekaboo!

If you’ve ever been to a volleyball tournament, you know that even the most stoic and reserved girl screeches through the match. The team comes together after each point in the center of the floor, putting their arms around each other and congratulating themselves.

“Ladies and gentlemen, your train is delayed due to switching problems,” an announcer might say over a loudspeaker to a group of commuters.

“Yeah, cool,” the commuters might scream as they come together in a circle of delight on the platform, tossing their briefcases to the side and jumping straight up in the air and pumping their fists.

Or, perhaps, you’re an enthusiastic coach and you’ve asked your child to pass the salt.

“Good job, kid, good job,” you might say in a voice that’s way too loud for an indoor meal.“Now, keep the salt in your right hand. Stay balanced. Focus only on the salt. Don’t shake it, don’t think about not shaking it or you’ll start to shake it. Now, ease it over here. Way to go, kid, you’re doing great. You’re almost there — that’s some great clutch salt passing. Now, after the meal, don’t forget to shake hands with the pepper and tell it that you had a good meal.”

Modern mythology, as it was for those Greeks and Romans long ago, is a carnival mirror. Mythology helps us see ourselves and our world using distortions to exaggerate truths or to give us a chance to focus on different parts of our lives and society.

The Greeks created these spectacular stories to understand how the sun crossed the sky to where spiders came from. The former occurred because Apollo pulled a chariot across the sky and the latter was a result of a mortal woman named Arachne engaging in a weaving contest with the goddess Athena.

For the Greeks, these stories offered a possible cause for the inexplicable and helped ordinary people cope with the seemingly arbitrary and capricious nature of events around them. Why, they might wonder, did their favorite tree die when lightning struck it? Zeus must have been upset about the latest offering or about the words you said when you were at the market. A chest of gold washed ashore near you? You must have done something to please Poseidon.

Our modern myths and heroes come from many places. People win Purple Heart decorations from grateful presidents, earn medals of honor for their valor, or walk or run hundreds of miles to raise money for worthy causes. The list, of course, is much longer than that: Scientists and doctors fight to find cures for cancer, autism, heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease and many other problems; firefighters race into burning buildings to save others; and police officers protect and serve our communities.

Hollywood wants a piece of the hero action, pumping out movies about people with the everyday courage to challenge conventional thinking. The studios have invested considerable money in the live action version of comic book characters, cranking out stories about men and women with spectacular powers, incredible toys and spirited enemies.

In a new twist, Batman and Superman will battle it out around the same time that Captain America and Iron Man clash. Is it a coincidence that these movies are coming out at around the same time? Maybe. Is it a coincidence that they’re coming out at the same time that Trump and Hillary get ready for the main event? Maybe not.

In any case, these movies, which hope to capture plenty of dollars, have seized on something visible in our carnival mirror. People, like their on-screen superheroes, want to do the right thing — whatever that may be. At the same time, others, driven by a similar desire, may pull in the opposite direction. A conflict is inevitable, particularly in the context of a modern world in which quick reflexes are more important than reason and consideration.

We don’t sleep on decisions anymore or consider our moves or the consequences. With people plugged in wherever they are, the world requires instant responses. Strength comes from thoughts that travel at the speed of Zeus’ lightning bolt.

Like the Greek gods who fought with each other, our modern movie heroes are no better than the rest of us. They are limited by their perspectives, weaknesses and a past that threatens to push them in the same decision-making rut.

What does the carnival mirror, at least the one that Hollywood is using, suggest about where we’re heading in a country divided between red and blue states, between us and them? I don’t know how these new movies end, but I suspect these superheroes learned to stop fighting and work together.

Hopefully, the Republicans and Democrats, who stand in front of the same flag and ask God to bless America, will figure out a way to reach across the aisle and create the kind of peace, security and prosperity we would all like to experience. Wouldn’t that be a nice Hollywood ending?

No more allowances. We want our children to eat, sleep and live well.

Do we set a good example for our offspring? We know that what we do is more important than what we say. Do we want them to text or talk on the phone when they’re driving? Of course not. Do we engage in either activity when they’re in the car? All the time. When you’re at the next stop sign or red light, look at the cars coming toward you. How many of those people are on the phone? Put down that phone! It’s not only safer for you, but it also gives your kids the right idea.

OK, sorry, teachers this next one isn’t aimed at all of you. I’m tired of reading all the deductions on my son’s and daughter’s homework assignments from teachers whose writing deserves demerits. Sure, we all make mistakes and, yes, we can’t be right all the time. But this is ridiculous. The directions contain numerous errors. Are teachers setting the right example when they misspell words, repeat a word or — gasp — use the incorrect form of your? They should take an extra second to edit and proofread the material they give their students. The message the children get when they read their teachers’ writing is that grammar, word choice and rules of writing are only important for students and for grades and don’t count, even inside the classroom. Children can spot hypocrisy from across the school.

Years ago, at P.J. Gelinas Junior High School, my seventh-grade math teacher, Mr. Braun, said we’d get an extra five points if we spotted an error in anything he did. He was challenging us and himself and was helping us learn — and benefit — from his mistakes. Did he not make errors because he knew we were watching carefully or did he only make that deal with us because he didn’t make many mistakes? Either way, we paid closer attention to his — and our — work.

OK, teachers, relax. I admire what you do and I appreciate the effort you put into your work. I know you have thousands of pages to grade. If you believe your writing matters, please lead by example.

Then there are coaches. We volunteers face a difficult task. We stand in front of a group of restless kids who want to score the winning basket, make their parents proud and be a hero. Everyone can’t play in every inning or in every second. We have difficult decisions. We also deal with parents who make unrealistic requests: “Yes, coach, can my daughter please bat first on Tuesday night games because she needs to leave early those nights.”

The kids watch us carefully, not only to see if we approve of how they do, but also to see how we react to difficult situations. We’ve coached in games where the other coach, the players on the other team or the referees are violating some written or unwritten sporting code. Maybe the other coach has told his pitchers not to throw strikes because it’s getting darker. If we can’t finish the game, the score reverts to the earlier inning when they were winning. This isn’t a hypothetical — I know of at least one case where this happened.

We could get angry, shout and throw equipment on the field. Is that the kind of behavior we should allow ourselves? Are we teaching our children how to deal with adversity? Do our allowances lead to their allowances later in life? Are we dooming them to repeat the actions we’re not proud of in the future?

Maybe one of the toughest parts about being a parent is learning how to grow beyond the limitations we’ve carried with us from childhood. Some of those spring from our adult allowances. How about if we take a moment to recognize the allowances we make for ourselves. That could be constructive for us and for the little eyes that record everything we do on their own version of YouTube.

The insults, the barbs,
the teasing galore.

The candidates fight
every night, but what is it for?

These men and this woman want our trust.

At this point, many warrant disgust.

Who are they who want a job like no other?

Do they listen, or do they make us shudder?

Are they good, are they smart, do they have what it takes?

Can they bring us to glory
and not become fakes?

What do we need in this
election year?

Are they really the ones
to calm our fear?

Hillary and Bernie duke it out,

they argue, fight
and sometimes they pout.

On the right, Cruz, Kasich and formerly Rubio chase
the man with the hair.

Trump is his name,
and they want their share.

He’s a bully, a braggart
and he’s way ahead.

The others sound desperate
and they seem to see red.

Mitt Romney has come
to throw sand in Trump’s face.

Mitt’s presence is odd, some say it’s a disgrace.

He lost but didn’t go gently
into that good night,

he’s worried about Trump
and wants a fierce fight.

We like to believe we are part
of a whole,

but we have huge differences down to our souls.

Some believe Muslims
should all stay away,

others suggest we should all have our say.

Protesters appear to cause
commotion,

the sounds and sights are fraught with emotion.

The wife of the president long ago,

Hillary is under fire for
making dough.

A university fight
nips at his heels,

Trump says, “It’s OK,
the school is real.”

The debates offer jabs
and tough one-liners,

some of these leaders could
be sporting shiners.

Tough choices now, the voters have to take sides.

With each new vote,
there’s nowhere to hide.

The country is vast,
it’s hard not to offend.

We’re different in New York from those in South Bend.

Bernie Sanders shares plans
that people adore.

He wants the working class
to have so much more,

but can he do half of what
he desires?

Or would he wind up putting out vast fires?

The people crave change,
it’s clear as a bell.

The same old approach
has no chance to sell.

We’re sick and tired of being tired and sick.

We the People don’t want
something so slick.

The rhetoric has grown
increasingly coarse,

it’s ugly, messy and the leaders sound hoarse.

Who will you choose
on Election Day?

Do you really want
anyone to stay?

Will the candidates discuss
issues that matter?

Or will they just make their own pocketbooks fatter?

On what do we agree,
from sea to sea?

What is there that’s common
to you and to me?

Can you picture these people when they were kids?

Do you think they were proud of all that they did?

Were they good to friends,
to teachers and foes?

Or did they know better
than average Joes?

When one of them wins and wants to lead us together,

will he or she make us stronger and help us get better?

They fight with their rivals
and say others are wrong,

how can any of them help people get along?

You have to vote, like it or not,

it’s our duty, we’re in a big spot.

Tune out the bluster
and the attacks,

and ask yourself if they
have our backs.

Who are they who want a job like no other?

Do they listen,
or do they make us shudder?

Are they good, are they smart, do they have what it takes?

Can they bring us to glory
and not become fakes?

Technology has made it possible for us to stick both of our virtual feet in our virtual mouths.

Last week, I wrote about poor sportsmanship by a father at a basketball game. Before I started the column, I asked my wife if she thought he might see the article and get upset. She said, “Wait, first, what’s the chance that he’ll look for it; and, second, it’s not like you’re going to be naming names.”

She was right. I wasn’t planning to put his name in the paper or call attention to him. He made a sudden barking noise while one of the players on the other team was about to shoot a free throw. The players on the other team, their coach and, most importantly, the referee took exception to his conduct. The referee ejected him.

Recognizing that there was something to share with TBR readers, I wrote about the incident. I’m sure this gentleman isn’t the only one to cross a line at a child’s sporting event. I’ve heard parents screaming at their kids, at their kids’ coaches, at referees and anyone who will listen in the heat of the moment. After all, these games are critically important. A loss might mean their child only gets a second-place trophy that will collect dust on a shelf somewhere, while a win would mean they would get a slightly bigger trophy that collects slightly more dust on a shelf somewhere else.

I wrote the column, sent it to my editor electronically and went about the usual business of my day. By about 6 p.m., it occurred to me that my editor didn’t acknowledge the column the way she usually does. Then it hit me, like a punch to my stomach. My breathing got shorter and shallower and my hands felt hot and cold at the same time.

With an anxious scowl on my face, I went back to my email “sent” folder and I saw it. “Oh no!” I shouted, stunned by my blunder. You see, my editor and the wife of the man who made a scene at the basketball game have the same first name. I had typed the first three letters of my editor’s name and the computer mischievously misdirected the column. I stand by what I wrote, but I had no intention of sending the column to this man’s wife.

Realizing my error, I frantically called my wife, which compounded my mistake. In the panic of the moment, I dialed my daughter’s cellphone number, who was in the middle of volleyball practice. She raced to call me back in case something was wrong. Something was, indeed, wrong, but I didn’t want to distract her. Forcing myself to try to sound calm, I said something like, “Nah-everything-all-right-bye.”

I finally reached my wife, who patiently talked me back from the ledge. She suggested I write to the man’s wife and tell her that I misfired in my email. It wasn’t the end of the world and, before long, my wife assured me I’d find it funny in a “I can’t believe I really did that” way.

I did what my wife suggested and the man’s wife said she thought I had sent her the column on purpose. I assured her it was a mistake. That’s where the conversation ended.

I have been on the other side of such emails. One of my editors wrote to someone she thought was another editor about how annoyed she was with my story. It’s about 20 years since that email reached me and I had almost forgotten about it … almost.

I can relate to Charlie Brown’s teacher. She speaks — and Charlie and his pals in the “Peanuts” cartoon hear noise without words.

As a coach of numerous teams, I have seen that blank look, recognized the glare and the stare and wondered if anyone would notice if I switched to a discussion of lollipops and subatomic particles.

I am near the end of a basketball season. As we were winning a recent game by 20 points, one of the boys on the bench confided that he wished the game was more competitive.

In our next game, he got his wish. In a physical contest, the officiating seemed unbalanced. How, several parents articulated with increasing volume as the first half drew to a close, did we get so few foul calls when we could see the red marks on our children’s arms and necks from contact with the opposing players?

With concerns about calls, parents and the kids became increasingly vocal. During my halftime talk, I could see the hurt and anger in the kids’ eyes. “How come he can keep pushing me and he doesn’t get called for a foul, and I go near him and the ref blows the whistle?” one of them asked.

Officiating isn’t easy. I was an umpire for baseball games in which every full-count pitch was a borderline strike. It was up to me to decide whether the boy struck out or to send him to first base.

Still, in that moment, as the coach of those boys on the basketball court, I was frustrated. I did what I imagine chairmen do: I sent my assistant coach to ask the referees about the calls. It was cowardly, but I wanted to stay on the court and try to manage through this tense contest. I could be the good guy and he could be the one whining.

I told the boys to play hard, stay focused and stick together. An eight-point deficit, I insisted, was manageable, especially with an entire half left in the game.

But then something happened early in the second half. As the game got close, one of the boys from the other team got fouled on a 3-point shot. He stepped to the line in a quiet gym. Just as he was getting ready to shoot, one of the parents on my team barked at him, making him alter his shot and causing him to miss. The referee threw out the parent and the boy made the next two free throws.

While I didn’t agree with many of the foul calls, I understood the need to eject the parent.

With the game close the rest of the way, parents, coaches and players became increasingly animated, sharing the kinds of noises you’d hear at a Red Sox-Yankees game. What’s the right message to offer the kids at the end of a tense game?

I got my answer a few days later, when I interviewed Port Jefferson Station’s Annie O’Shea, who has had a breakout year in the World Cup in skeleton racing. Driven by teamwork and an ability to prevent any adversity from turning into negative internal dialogue, O’Shea found the kind of consistent success she’d always sought. She won gold and silver medals in races against the top international sliders and finished fourth for the entire season in the World Cup.

She said she stays focused on each turn, without worrying about the clock, what someone said or anything else that might slow her down. It all started with a positive attitude. That kind of attitude doesn’t come from barking or from screaming about calls from officials. It comes from working together and staying focused.

So, did we win? Does it matter?

Recent headlines, displayed prominently on news sites around the world, were alarming, such as: “150,000 Adélie penguins killed by iceberg.” The stories suggested our flightless black-and-white friends were cut off by a Rhode Island-sized iceberg from their food supply. It was too late to save the “Happy Feet” characters. But the reality was anything but black and white.

“These headlines, while eye-popping, are not necessarily true,” said Heather Lynch, an assistant professor in the Stony Brook University Department of Ecology and Evolution. The stories came from a recent study, published in Antarctic Science. Lynch did not participate in the study, but is involved in monitoring penguin populations from satellites. “This idea that [these] penguins have perished doesn’t reflect the biology in hand,” she said. It will take “many years” before scientists are able to sort out the effect of this iceberg on penguin survivorship.

That’s because penguins can take a year or two off from breeding during unfavorable environmental conditions, which means that penguins displaced from breeding by an iceberg aren’t likely dead.

The scientists in the original study were linking the change in the breeding penguin population at Cape Denison — the site of a research station for famous Australian geologist and explorer Douglas Mawson about a century earlier — with the number of nesting pairs recorded after the arrival of iceberg B09B in 2010.

“There was some concern that there were dead chicks or frozen eggs at the site,” Lynch said. “We need to be cautious about interpreting that as evidence of some kind of catastrophic mortality event. There’s extremely high chick mortality rate under normal circumstances. That is the cycle of life.”

Reports about penguins losing habitat, breeding grounds or access to food typically lead to the kind of questions that were central to the “Happy Feet” story: What role do humans have in the process and what action, if any, is necessary to save the birds?

Kerry-Jayne Wilson, the lead author on the study and the chairperson of the West Coast Penguin Trust in New Zealand, offered some perspective.

“We did not suggest adult penguins had died,” she said in response to an email request for comment. “Some media outlet started” this rumor.

She said she believes most of the missing penguins are probably “out at sea, having assessed conditions as unsuitable for breeding.”

The authors sent out a clarifying press release in response to the stories: “It is unlikely many, if any, adult penguins have died as a result of this stranding event. This iceberg stranding event only affects Adélie penguins in the Commonwealth Bay area; the millions of Adélie penguins breeding around the rest of Antarctica are not affected.”

So, where did the story go wrong? For starters, a press release announcing the study used the headline: “Giant iceberg decimates Adélie penguin colonies.” The statement suggests that breeding has declined in the area, without indicating that 150,000 of Mr. Popper’s pals perished.

I turned to a representative at SBU’s Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science, which teaches scientists to make their research accessible to the public, to see if there are any lessons from this communication misfire.

Elizabeth Bass, director emerita of the center, suggested scientists needed to know their audience when sharing their research. “Be crystal clear about your findings,” she advised. In all the courses the center teaches, the message is to stress characterizing the work in a way that’s “not going to be misunderstood.”

Lynch is concerned that these type of stories, taken out of context, make it more difficult to share well-grounded science from future studies with policymakers.

“At some point, people stop listening and that’s what concerns me,” she said. “Real science whispers, it doesn’t shout.”